Jenny McCartney is a columnist for the Sunday Telegraph. On her blog, she offers hard-hitting analysis of social and political concerns and a witty deconstruction of modern celebrity culture.

How do drugs really get into our jails?

How do drugs really get into our jails? In a characteristically vigorous response to widespread criticism of his ban on books (or any other parcel) being sent in to prisons, the Justice Secretary Chris Grayling has made much of the security risk which such parcels allegedly carry, writing in Conservative Home: “So hands up who thinks we should make it easier to smuggle drugs into prison?”

He has painted a lively picture of a prison service inundated with post which acts as a thriving conduit for drugs and other forms of contraband: “an easy route for illegal materials.” Basic sense, eh?

Well, no. There seems to be little hard evidence from prison authorities that drug-laden parcels were ever an uncontrollable problem at all. Steve Gillan, the general secretary of POA (the trade union for prison staff) said: “For decades prison officers have dealt with parcels. They searched them. The reality is it was never really a problem. Now and then people tried to smuggle drugs in that way, but as professional prison officers we found these items. The majority of these books and magazines that came in didn’t have any drugs in them at all. People have been having their books and magazines sent in for 20, 30 years and all of a sudden it’s become a big issue for the secretary of state.”

Mr Gillan is no ideological firebrand: he says he agrees, as do I, with much of Grayling’s new Incentives and Earned Privileges Scheme, such as stopping Sky TV and letting prison officers have more control over rewards. But he clearly thinks that Mr Grayling’s current spin on the books issue is nonsense.

So do others who are also in a position to know something about prison security. Gareth Davies, the former governor of Pentonville prison, called the ban on sent-in books “barbarous”. And the chief inspector of prisons, Nick Hardwick, said that he thought it was a mistake to try to micromanage such policies from the centre rather than to leave some discretion with prison governors.

Few are in doubt, however, that drugs are freely available in UK prisons. A BBC investigation some years ago found that they were mainly brought in through organised “drops” over prison walls or clandestinely passed during visits. A minority of corrupt prison staff were also complicit in the problem, either by bringing drugs in themselves or turning a blind eye to the delivery. In any case, a copy of Huxley’s Brave New World does not appear to be the habitual route.

Meanwhile, drugs use at the privately-run, supersized jail HMP Oakwood near Wolverhampton – run by G4S and intended as a flagship model for the privately contracted future of the prison system – was reported last October to be twice the rate for similar prisons. So was the use of force to restrain prisoners, and the frequency of calling ambulances. Violence was rife. During a snap inspection, the administration was found to be chaotic. On more than one occasion prisoners told inspectors: “You can get drugs here but not soap.”

The relative of one inmate told a local newspaper: “The amount of drugs coming in is a joke – they’re coming in over the fence every day because it’s next to a main road. They’re even being stashed inside pigeon carcasses.” Inmates were also heavily trading prescription medicines. G4S – the company which, along with Serco, is being handed ever more control within the prison system – has promised to try and do better.

It would seem that incoming books are the least of Mr Grayling’s prison problems. But the trajectory of this “books ban” argument has nonetheless followed a now familiar pattern, one which has already been established in the Justice Secretary’s battle with the criminal bar (currently suspended after the MoJ struck a controversial deal yesterday with the Criminal Bar Association to freeze some fee cuts until after next summer).

The initial policy on sent-in parcels (rather like the original proposal to slash criminal barristers’ fees for legal aid work) was designed to appeal more to populist prejudice than practical common sense and decency. It has then been defended bullishly by Mr Grayling in the press by means of largely spurious arguments, in the hope that the news agenda will simply move on. And meanwhile large chunks of our prison and justice system are sliding towards very serious trouble indeed, and it appears that no one in authority has the grip to stop it.